Programmatic Instruments Research Articles

Policy instruments for sustainable tourism management in national parks: A comparative analysis of Colombia, Costa Rica, and Spain

Despite the current health crisis, global trends indicate that tourism all over the world will increase, especially in natural areas. This paper therefore aims to analyse the policy instruments for sustainable tourism management in national parks. The research focuses on three countries and two national parks in each: Los Nevados and Chingaza in Colombia, Manuel Antonio and Volcán Poás in Costa Rica, and Teide and Sierra de Guadarrama in Spain. A content analysis of official documents is carried out to identify organizational, normative and programmatic instruments. Organizational instruments for both tourism and the environment are represented graphically for each country, keywords are used to analyse normative instruments, and eleven topics and thirty-five subtopics are proposed as a means of exploring the inclusion of sustainable tourism criteria in programmatic instruments. The results show the areas where we believe there is room for improvement. These include coordination between those organizations in charge of protecting the environment and natural areas and those in charge of tourism, the inclusion of sustainable tourism in normative instruments, and greater emphasis to be placed on key topics for sustainability in the programmatic instruments, including carbon footprints and accessibility.
 Keywords: National parks, sustainable tourism, policy instruments

Indicators and Index of Elderly Well-Being to Support an Age–Friendly City

Introduction: Increasing the life expectancy of the elderly raises complex problems concerning the life aspects of the elderly, family, community, and government. A well-being indicator for the elderly is needed as a measurement tool to facilitate Indonesian elderly individuals to becoming more prosperous. The purpose of this study was to develop well-being indicators and to formulate the elderly well-being Index.Methods: This study used an explanatory research design with a quantitative approach. In total, 400 respondents were collected using multistage random sampling. The physical well-being variable used the Mini-Mental State Examination (MMSE) instrument, Barthel’s index, and the Disease Complaint questionnaire. In addition, a psychology and social well-being instrument, social well-being instrument, and spiritual instrument were employed. Confirmatory Factor Analysis was used to verify the factor structure of all of the observed variables.Results: The results showed that the indicators for elderly well-being are demographic with the following factor loading: (λ) 0.32, social environment (λ)=0.51, health services (λ)=0.55, physical well-being (λ=0.36 psychological well-being (λ)=0.46, social well-being (λ)=0.45 and spiritual well-being (λ)=0.50. The indicators and index can be used as an effort to drive the program, so then the elderly can become productive, prosperous, and meaningful.Conclusion: The elderly well-being index is expected to be a programmatic instrument that can measure and evaluate the welfare of the elderly. This will increase the elderly health program that is available to achieve more holistic well-being and an age-friendly city.

Prácticas de seguridad en América durante la posguerra fría (1992-2010): ¿complejos regionales o comunidades pluralistas de seguridad?

El nuevo regionalismo de seguridad en América, durante la posguerra fría, ha fallado en aportar suficiente evidencia empírica comparada para determinar la presencia de Complejos regionales de seguridad (CRS) o Comunidades pluralistas de seguridad (CPS). Frente a este problema el estudio busca responder ¿en qué medida las prácticas de seguridad prevalecientes en el continente durante la posguerra fría (1992-2010) permiten diferenciar los CRS o CPS en los niveles regionales y subregionales?Las prácticas de seguridad se estudiaron a partir de dos indicadores: las disputas interestatales militarizadas mediante estadísticas descriptivas y modelos econométricos, y la persistencia de la hipótesis de conflicto en instrumentos programáticos de defensa, mediante el análisis de contenido. Se concluye que el abordaje más apropiado lo ofrecen los CRS dada la persistencia de la amenaza y del uso de la fuerza como práctica de seguridad. La primacía de la agenda estadounidense en América del Norte, América Central y el Caribe implican la presencia de un CRS centrado por su proyección de poder e influencia mundial, mientras que en América del Sur se presenta un CRS estándar. En el nivel subregional, América Central y la zona Andina constituyen subcomplejos, mientras que el Cono Sur una comunidad pluralista de seguridad.

Políticas públicas em saúde mental e trabalho: desafios políticos e epistemológicos

O objetivo deste artigo é buscar compreender, a partir da perspectiva genealógica, as possibilidades de emergência dos enunciados que delimitam a relação entre Saúde Mental e trabalho e sua (des)articulação com as políticas de saúde do trabalhador. Como forma de apontar essas articulações e desarticulações, partimos de uma breve descrição analítica das Conferências Nacionais Brasileiras de Saúde do Trabalhador. Como hipóteses para a compreensão dos impasses para efetivar essa articulação, apresentamos os desafios políticos e epistemológicos que atravessam as formas de legitimação dos saberes-verdades nos campos da Saúde do Trabalhador e da Saúde Mental.

Turkish version of the pediatric quality of life inventory (PedsQL) 3.0 arthritis module: a reliability and validity study

Background and aim Most research on health-related quality of life (HRQoL) to date has focused on adults. However, the need to address QoL issues in chronically ill children has become a priority. The measuring of HRQoL, especially for these chronically ill children, is of importance not only for describing their actual situation and their health care needs, but also for evaluating clinical interventions. The Pediatric Quality of Life Inventory builds on a programmatic measurement instrument development effort by Varni and colleagues in pediatric chronic health conditions, including rheumatic diseases during the past 20 years. The PedsQL 3.0 Arthritis Module was designed to measure HRQoL dimensions specifically tailored for pediatric rheumatology. Validated version of PedsQL 3.0 Arthritis Module has been published for use in other languages but there was no Turkish version. The aim of this article is to describe the translation, cultural adaptation and validation of a Turkish version of the PedsQL 3.0 arthritis module in a population of juvenile idiopathic arthritis (JIA).

Using an environmental studies capstone to solidify and assess the integration of interdisciplinary learning at Pacific Lutheran University

Pacific Lutheran University restructured the capstone course for its Environmental Studies Program explicitly to foster interdisciplinary integration. Assignments assess the effectiveness of programmatic learning objectives in keeping with the Program’s mission, “…to engage actively and critically the complex relationships between people and the environment, drawing upon integrated and interdisciplinary perspectives.” This final course in the curriculum focuses specifically on the development of integrated and interdisciplinary perspectives. It builds on previous courses in our curriculum by asking each student to explore an environmental issue through the perspectives of at least two disciplines. Students are expected to integrate the methods and content of these two academic perspectives to develop more complete approaches to complex environmental challenges. Final capstone products are a public oral presentation and a 25–50-page academic paper. To accommodate a range of capstone questions and goals, the faculty created three templates from which the students can choose: investigative, interpretive, and advocacy. Two sets of guiding questions facilitate conversations between students and their disciplinary faculty mentors and lead to integrative analyses. Five short writing assignments focus student attention on the issue, chosen disciplines, audience, methodology, and integrative analyses central to their capstones. These assignments catalyze class discussion about the elements of a capstone, evidenced-based arguments from different disciplinary perspectives, and the writing process. The final short writing assignment, which specifically addresses integration, is used as the key programmatic assessment instrument. These changes have increased the quality of student–faculty mentor conversations and enhanced the complexity of classroom discussions and student outcomes.

Efectividad de la ayuda oficial al desarrollo y los nuevos principios e instrumentos para la cooperación al desarrollo en salud. Informe SESPAS 2008

Years after its inception, the results of official development aid in terms of poverty reduction are still limited. Among the causes, especially in the health sector, are aid dispersion and its divergence from priorities and mechanisms of recipient countries’ public policies. The Paris Declaration of the High Level Forum on AIDS Effectiveness (2005) fostered an agreement on the principles to be adopted to improve the effectiveness of aid by strengthening recipient countries governments’ leadership of the aid and reducing aid delivery transaction costs. Aiming at these principles, the use of new instruments –programmatic instruments– and new approaches – the sector wide approach– are being promoted to increase the effectiveness of aid. Despite some weaknesses, the assessment conducted on their utilization seems to show better performance than that achieved with traditional instruments. Spain joined the Paris Declaration in March 2005 and incorporated the use of programmatic instruments and the participation in sector-wide approaches in its new Cooperation Policy, thus initiating a significant change from previous strategies that mainly encompassed project implementation and technical advice. The new strategies directed at strengthening public policy in recipient countries provide an opportunity to increase the effectiveness of aid; however, major changes are needed for their implementation.

Reliability and validation of a psychiatric assessment instrument for the hospital treatment of adults.

A psychiatric instrument, the Clinical Assessment Inventory, is an integral part of a comprehensive hospital treatment program for adults based upon behavioral technology ( 2 ) . The inventory was designed to provide a daily, quantitative, behavioral assessment of patients' progress when completed twice daily by nursing staff, once by the day shift and once by the evening shift. Each patient is observed during regularly scheduled nursing rounds and rated as to presence or absence of 50 sub-categories of behavior, yielding a total score range for the entire day of 0 to 100 points. Major categories are general appearance, orientation, inferred mood, speech form, speech content, social interaction, room maintenance, program cooperation, program participation, and global rating. The total score determines to which of three levels of therapeutic activities and privileges the patient will be assigned the day following. Daily staff review of the individual items pinpoints specific behaviors to be targeted clinically for individually tailored, treatment planning. Independent observations and ratings of 10 patients in a private, acute, psychiatric hospital were made by pairs of nursing staff during day and evening shifts for five successive weekdays. Average percentage agreement for the day shift was 88.4 and for the evening shift was 88.6. Average reliabiliry for the day shift was .852 and for the evening shift was .853. The correlation between scores on Day 2 and Day 3 of hospitalization for 100 patients was .945. Observer reliability and stability of total scores are adequate for this inventory to be used as a clinical and a research instrument. As a preliminary external test of validity, patients were administered the Short Clinical Rating Scale ( 1 ) on the day prior to discharge from the hospital. Correlation with Clinical Assessment Inventory scores on char day was ,774 ( p > .001, df = 98) . The rating scale has primarily been utilized in research to assess patients' progress through observation by nursing staff; whereas, the inventory is designed primarily as an integrated programmatic instrument. Preliminary assessment of validity and reliability indicates potential for use in research with acute, adult psychiatric patients.